a certain cynical audacity in her
speech, or whether it lay in her assumption of a certain coyness and
archness, or whether there was any affectation at all in the matter.
However that might be, there could be no doubt about the sincerity of
those gray eyes of hers. There was something almost cruelly frank
in the clear look of them; and when her face was not lit up by some
passing smile the pale and fine features seemed to borrow something
of severity from her unflinching, calm and dispassionate habit of
regarding those around her.

Sheila was prepared to like Mrs. Lorraine from the first moment she
had caught sight of her. The honesty of the gray eyes attracted her.
And, indeed, the young widow seemed very much interested in the young
wife, and, so far as she could in that awkward period just before
dinner, strove to make friends with her. Sheila was introduced to
a number of people, but none of them pleased her so well as Mrs.
Lorraine. Then dinner was announced, and Sheila found that she was
being escorted across the passage to the room on the other side by the
young man whom she had seen get out of the hansom.

This Lord Arthur Redburn was the younger son of a great Tory duke;
he represented in the House a small country borough which his father
practically owned; he had a fair amount of ability, an uncommonly high
opinion of himself, and a certain affectation of being bored by the
frivolous ways and talk of ordinary society. He gave himself credit
for being the clever member of the family; and if there was any
cleverness going, he had it; but there were some who said that his
reputation in the House and elsewhere as a good speaker was mainly
based on the fact that he had an abundant assurance and was not easily
put out. Unfortunately, the public could come to no decision on
the point, for the reporters were not kind to Lord Arthur, and the
substance of his speeches was as unknown to the world as his manner of
delivering them.

Now, Mrs. Lorraine had intended to tell this young man something about
the girl whom he was to take in to dinner, but she herself had been
so occupied with Sheila that the opportunity escaped her. Lord Arthur
accordingly knew only that he was beside a very pretty woman, who was
a Mrs. Somebody--the exact name he had not caught--and that the few
words she had spoken were pronounced in a curious way. Probably, he
thought, she was from Dublin.

He also arrived at the conclusion that she was